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Wednesday, February 29, 2012

In a speech last week given at Al Azhar, Ismail Haniya rallied worshipers during the Friday congregational prayers in light of the plight of Palestinian, Muslim worshipers in Jerusalem, who were being violently put down by Israeli forces. While the screen split between the reality of Al Aqsa under the Judiazation of Jerusalem and Haniya's speech, one side of the screen shows suffering while the other shows lobbying done for an interest outside of Jerusalem. Haniya was loading his shopping cart with Egyptian cries of support, televised into propaganda, after cutting ties with Bashar al Assad. Leading the chanting and later being seen paraded in the street, Haniya decried Iran, Hezbollah, and Bashar al Assad in Egypt's capital and heart of its own uprisings.

Sunday, February 26, 2012

The number game Israel plays as it arrests Palestinians is nothing but a mere smudging of numbers to satisfy the agenda of Zionists. Within the period of the first wave of the prisoner swap deal, an equivalent amount of Palestinians were arrested as those released. 309 still remain in administrative detention today, voiceless and still without charge that would justify their arrest.

The preemptive nature of colonization is nothing about security, but is a means of collective punishment. And sadly, some of those released during the prisoner swap deals have only found themselves in Israeli prisons once again. As Israeli continously violates the human rights of Palestinians, and continues to arrest Palestinians without charges and imprisoning them, the mechanism of Israeli military remains unchallenged despite the prisoner swap deal. While numbers of prisoners exchanged, there was certainly no will for Israel to change its policy as it continues to oppress Palestinians.

Saturday, February 25, 2012

Frustrated by the news of Friday's clashes in Jerusalem and violence in Al Khalil (Hebron) I attempted to go to Qalandia checkpoint amid news that clashes had broken out there. I weaved through the mess of Kufr Akkab, which is disenfranchised by the Palestinian Authority and Israel and literally sits in filth, potholes, and busted water pipes.

Finally I turned onto the main road where the UN Boys School is located, only to find that traffic was so backed up that cars were driving along the gutter, going against traffic. I slowed down, unable to see the actual checkpoint. It was obvious it was shut down. Cars were coming at me from the wrong direction, including an ambulance. That is when I spotted this rainbow

Whether or not it was the young martyr, Talat Ramia, who was on that ambulance will always be on my mind. I turned around and ran against traffic just like the others. I followed the ambulance back home, as I live next door to the hospital where martyrs die. I saw the ambulance head back to the checkpoint for more. I got out of the car, went inside, had lunch.

These Israeli Zionists religiously believe their Jewish God has chosen them to replace the outdated European colonialism with a new form of colonialism, so well disguised that it will enable them to deceive the African masses into submitting willingly to their "divine" authority and guidance, without the African masses being aware that they are still colonized.

- Malcolm X, Egyptian Gazette, September 17, 1964

How can one really liberate oneself when their identity has to be reconstructed from the shards of violent, American slave trade? While Malcolm X grew up in a Christian household, he became a Muslim and yet he always remained a victim of the American experience no matter how free he felt in his identity.

If the Christian gospel was not attractive, and Muslims were seen as something foreign to the American narrative, what else could an African American identify with when their very identity itself had been manipulated and erased by American and European colonists?

Friday, February 24, 2012

Of all the words to choose, when language is one of the building blocks of oppression, they had to choose occupy? Minorities talk about how offensive the word is while certain people talk about ownership, space, control, and essentially use the same terminology of the oppressor to justify their movement for "justice." Like one of the speakers says, it is amazing how capitalism is ingrained that branding seems like a necessity.

Don't occupy. Liberate. And coming from Palestine, the word occupy can never become a good thing. It is a word where you take space. This should not be about taking. By using these words it will easily flip into more oppression. Words have that much power. Liberate your minds first, then talk about space.

Sunday, February 19, 2012

The common struggle is often overlooked and complicated with nationalism or other forms of sectarianism. Solidarity is communicated often but sometimes supporters do not immediately decipher the relationship between these struggles, overlooking human dignity as the main relation between all struggles of justice. The conditions of prisons in various societies are indicators of that society's values. And when it comes to those locations where who you are can be enough to get you into prison, the identity of the oppressor whether American, British, or Israeli is merely the same, just dressed up a little differently in each location. The accent may be different, but prisons in most societies speak the language of dehumanization.

Friday, February 3, 2012

For twenty years now the international donor community has financially supported Palestinian institution-building, infrastructure development, the economy, public employees' salaries, health and education, social welfare, the police, electricity production, private credit guarantees, and the bigger part of the civil society organizations with regards to democracy promotion, human rights, tolerance, women rights etc.

Peace and the establishment of a Palestinian state have been the declared goals of all the support. But actual results are the fragmentation and pacification of the Palestinian people.

This documentary film, directed by Mariam Shahin and George Azar, and funded by the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, features Palestinian criticism of this externally funded "development".

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

15 minutes outside and you will drown in the tears of Ramallah. She is glowing with confusion and smeared with the pollution of politics. Lost in her emotions we shiver and warm our hearts with heat artificially replacing what once was tradition. As Ramallah cries, less people frequent her. They run from her. They go back to their villages and talk about how cold she was.

But what about us who have to stay here? What do we call home except the roads repaved so diplomats have a more comfortable ride, the spots where old houses now have four stories built atop , and all the English scarring the face of abused Arabs?

We know Ramallah because she is inside of us, and we cry with her and wander in her streets trying to set her free. We walk through one memory best known by constant recitation, turning the corner where the son has inherited his father's shop, and we look for our grandmothers and grandfathers now in a place overcome with the paintbrush of foreign taste and normalization between vendors of coffee and spices.